Lines: 17 X-Admin: news@aol.com From: mnterence@aol.com (MNTERENCE) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Date: 29 May 2003 06:09:13 GMT Organization: AOL, http://www.aol.co.uk Subject: Tolkien in the mountains Message-ID: <20030529020913.04299.00000854@mb-m15.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!nntp.infostrada.it!newsfeed01.sul.t-online.de!t-online.de!news.belwue.de!news.uni-stuttgart.de!news.stealth.net news.stealth.net!news.stealth.net!ngpeer.news.aol.com!audrey-m1.news.aol.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:117840 Being a fan of "literary tourism," I've just returned from attempting to retrace the young Tolkien's steps during the summer of 1911 through the mountains of central Switzerland. All I had to go on were the appropriate passages in "The Hobbit" and "LotR" and the brief mentions to be gleaned from Humphrey Carpenter's biography and entries 232 and 306 in "Letters," and it has now, rather belatedly, occured to me that there may be other references to the trip which might have offered further clues to his itinerary, companions and general experience. Can anyone help on this one? It did pass through my mind that Tolkien himself may have been to some small extent a literary tourist, in that he visited Meiringen and possibly therefore the nearby Reichenbach Falls, putative scene of Sherlock Holmes' dramatic demise. R. Carter ###### From: mair_fheal@yahoo.com (coyotes morgan mair fheal greykitten tomys des anges) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: Tolkien in the mountains Date: Wed, 28 May 2003 23:23:21 -0700 Organization: eden huntersstrand Message-ID: References: <20030529020913.04299.00000854@mb-m15.aol.com> X-Complaints-To: abuse@supernews.com Lines: 20 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!newsfeed.icl.net!newsfeed.fjserv.net!news.algonet.se!algonet!news.tele.dk!news.tele.dk!small.news.tele.dk!sn-xit-02!sn-xit-04!sn-xit-01!sn-post-01!supernews.com!corp.supernews.com!c28.ppp.tsoft.com!user Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:117956 In article <20030529020913.04299.00000854@mb-m15.aol.com>, mnterence@aol.com (MNTERENCE) wrote: > Being a fan of "literary tourism," I've just returned from attempting to > retrace the young Tolkien's steps during the summer of 1911 through the > mountains of central Switzerland. All I had to go on were the appropriate > passages in "The Hobbit" and "LotR" and the brief mentions to be gleaned from i found rivendell recently an unexpected canyon deeply riven a narrow zig zag trail down the canyon wall while below the stream chatters among the stones down down into the twilight to a narrow bridge this bridge however had handrails come visit alum rock park in east san jose if youre ever in town ###### From: Barb Beier Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: Tolkien in the mountains Date: Thu, 29 May 2003 09:06:46 -0500 Organization: Posted via Supernews, http://www.supernews.com Message-ID: References: <20030529020913.04299.00000854@mb-m15.aol.com> X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 1.93/32.576 English (American) trialware MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Complaints-To: abuse@supernews.com Lines: 25 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!cyclone.bc.net!sjc70.webusenet.com!news.webusenet.com!sn-xit-02!sn-xit-06!sn-post-01!supernews.com!corp.supernews.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:118094 On 29 May 2003 06:09:13 GMT, mnterence@aol.com (MNTERENCE) wrote: >Being a fan of "literary tourism," I've just returned from attempting to >retrace the young Tolkien's steps during the summer of 1911 through the >mountains of central Switzerland. All I had to go on were the appropriate >passages in "The Hobbit" and "LotR" and the brief mentions to be gleaned from >Humphrey Carpenter's biography and entries 232 and 306 in "Letters," and it has >now, rather belatedly, occured to me that there may be other references to the >trip which might have offered further clues to his itinerary, companions and >general experience. Can anyone help on this one? Unfortunately, not me. But what a good way to spend vacation! His descriptions of the Ford of Bruinen and Rivendell, in particular, and also Caradhras and its environs, are so detailed, I've always thought he was describing actual places. Did you find any of them? >It did pass through my mind that Tolkien himself may have been to some small >extent a literary tourist, in that he visited Meiringen and possibly therefore >the nearby Reichenbach Falls, putative scene of Sherlock Holmes' dramatic >demise. Which, now that you mention it, was not unlike Glorfindel's fall off a mountain, taking a "bad guy" with him. And, like Glorfindel, Holmes did indeed return to the land of the living again. ###### From: wares@fordham.edu (Michael Wares) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: Tolkien in the mountains Date: 2 Jun 2003 13:49:24 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Lines: 35 Message-ID: <2b413897.0306021249.432e1621@posting.google.com> References: <20030529020913.04299.00000854@mb-m15.aol.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 150.108.154.133 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1054586964 29821 127.0.0.1 (2 Jun 2003 20:49:24 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 2 Jun 2003 20:49:24 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!irazu.switch.ch!switch.ch!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:118158 mnterence@aol.com (MNTERENCE) wrote in message news:<20030529020913.04299.00000854@mb-m15.aol.com>... > Being a fan of "literary tourism," I've just returned from attempting to > retrace the young Tolkien's steps during the summer of 1911 through the > mountains of central Switzerland. Here's a striking passage from _Meditations on Middle-Earth_, a collection of essays on JRRT by authors of fantasy. Thanks to Steve Summit for finding the passage for me. In "The Longest Sunday", Diane Duane writes of being on Mount Rigi, in Switzerland: "I looked down into the grass and saw there something I hadn't been expecting: little, white six-petalled flowers, about an inch across. And a voice, Sam's voice, said in my head, 'Do you remember the elanor, the sun-star, that we saw in the grass in Lorien?' ".... the alpine crocus .... throws a 'sport' version in about one bulb of every twelve: a six-petalled version with little tips of pale gold .... They are (I think) elanor: for Tolkien holidayed in these mountains, and would certainly have seen them. " .... from [Rigi] can be seen mountains more regal ... the Eiger, the Monch, and the Jungfrau. Tolkien hiked at the feet of these mountains, before he went to war. And when I stood up from seeing my first elanor, I looked across the great blue gulf of air and saw them there, as perhaps he did (for he would have ridden this cog railway, too): Celebdil, Fanuidhol, and Caradhras the Cruel; Silvertine, Cloudyhead, and the terrible Redhorn. For just a flicker of time, genuinely, physically, I was in Middle-earth." Michael Wares